It is clear that the judgment of the observer even in the most rigorous psychophysical experiment depends upon the integration of information from a number of sources. Psychophysicists and psychophysiologists have minimized the role of situational or contextual variables in determining judgments. On the other hand, workers concerned with perception in social settings have emphasized the important role of situational variables. Our long-term goal is a complete theory of perceptual judgment in which we attempt to answer (1) questions concerning information transfer from both the psychophysiological and abstract cognitive points of view; (2) the classical question of the psychophysicist, that is to say, what is the function relating the physical stimulus to the sensitivity of the organism; and (3) the more general question of how information from various sources is integrated to determine the judgment. To this end we propose research centered on three main topics of auditory perception: 1. Stimulus determinants of judgment in detection, recognition and discrimination experiments. 2. Physiological correlates of judgment. 3. The role of contextual variables in determining judgments.